decadency | Lord it's a hard life God makes you live.

Current Location: Sioux Falls, South Dakota

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Lord it's a hard life God makes you live.

With the cessation of holiday hours at Target, Cas once again has the onerous task of filling free time. He avoided that problem for the last four months. The final weeks of September and the entirety of October he devoted to refitting a living space in Bobby's old house. Whatever happened to the house—a fire, he thinks, with neat illogic, because fire follows the Winchesters, the fires of childhood homes and the fires of Hell, until they burn, burn, burn—much of it remains uninhabitable. The wind of a strong storm would likely topple two of the exterior walls; most the interior is nothing but char. But there are some salvageable things—always, always something to save.

When the weather turned cold and the winter wind bites through the newspaper on the walls, that thought makes Cas grin, as hard and brittle as the wind. It's a joke Dean wouldn't appreciate, but would have understood nonetheless. Wherever Dean's soul is now.

He arrived in Sioux Falls in mid-September. As far as he can tell, Lucifer sent him exactly three years into the past—an alternative past. What the value of "alternative" is remains to be discovered. Due to various circumstances, none of them relevant now, it took him six weeks to travel from the Sanitarium that housed Lucifer's garden and Dean's final resting place in 2014 to Bobby's house in Sioux Falls in 2011. Six weeks or negative one hundred and fifty weeks.

The destruction of the house, and within two weeks, the discovery of the Impala, proved to Cas that Dean and Bobby are no more alive in this world than they were in his own. He doesn't know what happened to Sam. The world hasn't ended; he has no reason now to search for Sam Winchester.

Whatever demise the Winchesters met, and Bobby by extension, it didn't happen here. Through his careful exploration of the first floor of the house—his drive for self-destruction takes the form of ingesting as many chemicals as possible to provide relief or stimulation, not breaking his leg on navigating derelict stairs—he found a few books that survived the fire, as well as a few pieces of furniture he could appropriate for his own use: a kitchen chair, a table he could repair, a bed frame. But no bodies. No bones. He tried not to decide if that was a cause for relief (foolish hope) or despair (funeral rites are human practices, and he's not, he's not).

One of the books contained photographs. His employee discount at Target purchased a collection of picture frames. He tried not to crumble the charred edges when he tucked the photos safely behind glass.

They litter the surfaces of his room now: Sam and Dean as children or as young men; Bobby and other hunters Cas made the acquaintance of before they died. He likes the photographs, pieces of memory frozen eternally, even if they aren't his memories. He likes them almost as much as he likes the books. Very little of Bobby's library survived, but he saved what he could and then added his own in the last few months. Short-story fiction and philosophy are his favourites, but he buys whatever hooks his attention, or whatever seems popular with the shoppers at Target.

Humans craft stories to explain the world to themselves. He always wanted to understand them, resolved himself to live among them, even if now he lives miles and miles from another living person and contents himself with a room full of paper-thin images and distant knowledge. Living here isn't much different to being an angel. In a way, he's gone home.

For all that it may be lonely, he likes the home he's made for himself here. It may not involve waking up in sheets that smell like Dean and sex, or coming into a kitchen to be greeted with the smell of bacon frying and Dean smiling. But Cas has known those desires were only fantasy for years. Here, a generator runs two lamps, a space heater, and a hot plate when he needs it to eat up cans of soup. The bathroom down the hall miraculously still has running water, even with one of the walls missing. It's cold, and he worries as winter sets its teeth into South Dakota that the pipes will freeze, but it's better than no water. All in all, the commodities are no different than what they had at the camp, but with the addition of no one trying to kill them, no Croatoan virus, no torture, no traumatized refugees.

No Dean.

His shift ended tonight at eight, but they sent him home at seven due to lack of customers. Early on the floor manager decided it was better for him to focus on stocking and cleaning rather than interacting with people, but no customers means nothing to stock. He had spent the last hour leaning on the handle of his mop in the children's section, reading Harry Potter. Now, two hours later and dinner already prepared and consumed, he wishes he had bought Chamber of Secrets when they told him to go home. He has National Public Radio playing on the radio in the Impala outside, but listening to it means keeping the door open, and the evening February chill is no match for his space heater. He lies on the box spring he pulled out of what he thinks is the living room, curled under the pink and green floral comforter he bought as a set from Target's clearance aisle, despite having no pillows to put the pillow cases on, and tries to let the soft voices debating abortion lull him to sleep. Questions of mortality no longer interest him, but the news will be on in another hour, the nightly debrief for any signs or clues what happened in this world to keep it from becoming his own. Until then, he has a bottle of whiskey to keep him occupied, as well Bobby's stash of pain killers and sedatives in the table drawer.

Perhaps tomorrow he'll drive back to Target to buy Harry Potter. His day off can involve learning what becomes of Harry.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

In hindsight, it was obvious that it was a mistake. But he can't tell you why. Their friendship might have been—better, less brittle and fractured in places, if sex hadn't been a brief part of their relationship. Initiating sex never got him what he wanted, and it harmed what they might have had otherwise. That's why it was a mistake. He knows no way to explain that, though. It's largely irrelevant now. This is one night, and they have no future.

He turns his face towards the passenger-side window, leaning his weight into your side, hand settling against your thigh. "I felt something."

The version of him that existed here, and died. He doesn't know how he wouldn't have felt something for you. He doesn't know when it started, if something changed in him the moment he saw you in Hell, but he should have been aware of it by now, even as an angel. He should have known he loved you, even if he didn't know how or whether to express it.

It's not something he sees a point in discussing. He doesn't want—to ruin whatever small amount of peace they've established for right now. He wants to pretend that none of that ever happened, or that none of it matters now. They're together; he wants to be together.

You don't answer him. Not really. You just lean against him and tell him that you felt something. It takes him a moment to understand that you're referring to his previous statement about the Cas of this world rather than his question. When he does, he feels a twinge in his chest, an uncomfortable contrast to the pleasant tingling spreading out from where your hand is resting on his thigh. You felt something. But he wasn't there until it was too late.

He doesn't want to think about that. He doesn't want to think about you, the you of this world, or the fact that you're not a girl. He doesn't need to think about it. Shifts a little so he can slide his arm around your shoulders, tug you in a little closer against him.

"Let's just pretend right now, all right?" That's what you asked for. He'd like to do that. Pretend for one night that things went differently. Pretend for one night that it doesn't matter that you're a guy, that they can do this and it won't be wrong, or bad, or doomed. Pretend for one night that they can do whatever they want. They can go back to the real world tomorrow morning.

Your arm sliding around his shoulders pulls him out of the melancholy he can feel himself beginning to fall into. You want to pretend. He can almost believe that's true. If you're doing this for him, you're—very dedicated.

And you must be doing this for him. They wouldn't need to pretend if you felt otherwise.

He slouches down in the seat so your arm fits more comfortably around him without straining your shoulder, and twists into you. His nose brushes against your neck, between your jaw and the collar of your jacket, trailing up the line of your nose to nudge between your ear. You still smell the same, like sweat and hot metal, even in the February cold. He presses a soft kiss behind your ear, nuzzling with his nose before he opens his mouth to scrape his teeth lightly over the bolt of your jaw. They should pretend; he wants to pretend.

"Dean." Your name comes out as a sigh, fond, and he smiles against your skin. He loves you, Dean. Being with you makes him happy. He knows it would make him happy. "Maybe, uh, we can eat—burgers afterwards?" Whenever they get tired of making out? Or, more accurately, when it gets too cold for you and too sexually frustrating for him. He hasn't had a cheeseburger in years. But he remembers them. He remembers eating them with you, and your enjoyment for them. His fingernails rake up and down your thigh. They should eat cheeseburgers tonight, Dean; say yes.

He smiles a little when you snuggle closer and adjust their positions so it's more comfortable for both of them. You fit against him fairly well, your frame not quite as narrow as a woman's, but slim enough to make a good fit. The comfortable, warm buzz of having you next to him and touch him returns when he feels your nose against his neck. He tips his head a little to the side to give you better access, then grunts when he can feel your teeth scraping over his jaw. You're not bad at this at all, Cas.

When he comes up to the field you mentioned, he remembers it. He's driven past it often enough. He slows down, pulls off the road, his arm around you tightening as the Impala bounces over uneven ground. He smiles a little when you suggest that they could get burgers, presses the clutch down and eases the car to a stop far enough from the road to be hidden from unlikely passer-bys. Then he shifts a little to the side to be able to look at you more easily.

"We could do that. If we can find a burger joint that's open." It's a good idea, but he's not paying it as much attention as it probably deserves. Your eyes are distracting him. The car's not moving now, he doesn't need to watch the road, and you're right there, pressed up against his side and looking up at him with those wide, blue eyes. "You've got the most unlikely eye-color, Cas."

He doesn't wait for you to reply. He leans in and pulls you in closer so he can press his lips to yours. His mouth is closed for now, the kiss careful, chaste. Exploring. Your lips are dry, the stubble around them strange, unfamiliar. He shifts a little closer, moves his hand that is not around your shoulders to rest on top of the one you've got on his thigh. Keep that there, Cas. That feels good.

When you turn to look at him, he pulls back on reflex, startled into meeting your eyes. He doesn't mean to do that. You're still—almost painful to look at. It makes something inside of him ache fiercely. You're different here. Your soul is different. But you're still Dean.

He misses you. He missed you. He's sorry.

Green eyes are genetically more uncommon than blue eyes; beyond that, the colour of his vessel's eyes have little to do with him. But he doesn't have a chance to respond because then you lean in. He gasps at the first touch of your mouth, jerking back a fraction of an inch before he stills himself and relaxes, letting you take your time to explore. He wants to deepen the kiss, but he waits for a while, head lolling back against your arm with a low sound of appreciation when you firm the pressure. It's difficult to remain passive. His hand clenches around your thigh, taking the cue to leave it there, palm digging down into the muscle as he pushes back into the seat, neck stiff, almost as though he's trying to get away from you.

He doesn't want to scare you off, or do something you don't like.

"Dean . . . " His lips brush against yours, muffling your name. His neck is starting to ache from holding it at an awkward angle. Opening his eyes, he stares almost cross-eyed at the arch of your cheekbone until you pull back. "Can we—go in the back?"

Like this, the steering wheel's in the way, and one of his arms is pinned uselessly between their bodies. He wants to pull you against him. He wants to touch you. He wants to be able to kiss you back.

He growls appreciatively when you tighten your hand on his thigh. It's not a woman's hand, not a woman's touch, but that's okay. He likes the firm grip. You pull back further, keep the kiss very light, very chaste, and he shifts a little closer still. Come on, Cas. You wanted this, right?

Something's not right. You say his name, and he pulls back, blinking. A little concerned. What's up? You want to go in the back. It takes him a moment to process that, but then he realizes that the position they're in is kind of awkward. Kind of uncomfortable. If not very uncomfortable. He nods.

"Sure, yeah. Good idea." He gives you a bit of a smile as he pulls away—reassuring. Encouraging? Mostly, he just wants to make you move quickly. He himself does, opening the driver's door and sliding into the back with comfortable ease. He likes knowing the dimensions of his ride like his back pocket. He's missed his car. Almost as much as he's missed you.

He sits in the back, one knee pulled up and resting on the seat so he can sit sideways, and waits for you to join him.

Good idea. His eyebrows go up. Really? Is it? He keeps expecting you—to say no. To put a stop to things. To decide that this is one compromise too much and take back your original agreement to spend tonight with him. But you're not. You're smiling. And you're getting out of the car to get into the back seat.

He sits for a moment, flummoxed. This isn't going how he thinks it should, despite his desires and intentions. It doesn't make sense. He shouldn't—get what he wants. But he is. You seem willing. Very willing. And he's wasting his chance. You may not have done this before in this world, but that also means—you may not have the scars from it. Maybe it was never the act itself that bothered you, but something else. Something he did? He hadn't had sex before, the first time he had sex with you in his world. He might have done something wrong—gave you the wrong impression?—which ruined everything that followed. That seems like such a petty reason, if it was nothing but a misunderstanding that perpetuated for years and never was resolved. He should be angry about that. But he can be angry later. When you're not waiting in the backseat for him.

Pushing up on one knee on the seat, he turns around to look at you. You seem just as eager as before. It's strange. His eyes narrow. He wonders how far your eagerness extends. "Take off your jacket?" Please. He takes his off, leaving it on the seat next to him. His sweatshirt and flannel shirt follow, along with his gloves. In just his long-sleeve shirt from the camp, it's cold, but he plans to warm up soon. He crawls over the seat into the back, not as a graceful as he could be, but not exactly awkward. He's had a vessel for years; he's learned how to employ it by now. It lands him in your lap, his knee between your legs, straddling your thigh. One hand he braces on the roof of the car for balance as he leans over you. It effectively traps you in the corner between the seat and the door with his body.

"Okay?" With them positioned like this. While waiting for your answer, he threads the fingers of his free hand through the hair above your ear, tilting your head up so he can lean down to kiss you. It's far less hesitant now, the way he likes to kiss, direct and with purpose. He runs the tip of his tongue along your bottom lip to encourage you to let him deepen the kiss.

You haven't moved yet when he slides into the backseat, but you start moving just before he can prompt you to. He meets your eyes as you look at him and ask him to take off his jacket. That makes him swallow, but he reaches for his lapels, starts to tug the brown leather coat off his shoulders—then stops for a moment, distracted by watching you lose your layers. Coat, sweatshirt, shirt, until you're in your long-sleeve t-shirt, just a thin layer of fabric doing a bad job of protecting you from the cold. He swallows, and after a moment's hesitance snags his shirt lapels as well as his jacket, pulls both of them off together. He's just in his t-shirt now, too. His t-shirt and jeans. You need to get back here now, or he's going to get cold.

And you do. As you clamber over the backrest, he's momentarily distracted by watching your feet with a concerned expression. Don't leave streaks of boot dirt on the ceiling, Cas. But you don't. Instead, you land in his lap, your face suddenly very close, his hands sliding up your sides and back to balance you. He nods when you ask him if he's okay, throat too dry to reliably produce words. You're really close like this. And your crotch is pressed right up against his thigh. He lets you tilt his head, meets your lips in a kiss as he shifts his leg to press up against you. His hands slide around to your back, and he curls his fingers into the fabric of your t-shirt, scraping against your skin as he parts his lips. He nudges his tongue against yours—an invite. Come on in.

Your thigh presses right up against his groin. He's not sure if that's purposeful or not. It seems likely that it is. Your nails scraping against his skin as you grab handfuls of his shirt and pull him nearer suggest so. It suggests that you want this.

You want this. That's an extreme level of dedication to tonight.

He doesn't want to question it any longer. Whatever your reasons are—and he plans to ask in the morning—they're reasons that work towards the same outcome as his own desires. He should have drank more at the house. Doubting comes too naturally now, but he can try to ignore for the moment.

The slide of your tongue against his helps.

As he falls into the rhythm of the kiss, he twists his body and pushes with his hand on the roof until your slide further down into the seat, reclined so he can stretch out on top of you. It shifts his weight from his knees to his hips against yours, stomachs pressed together. His foot scrapes against the floor of the car as he shoves his body into alignment with yours, his thigh pressed against your groin in a mirror image to your thigh against his, locked together like puzzle pieces. The full body contact feels blessedly good. No one has touched him in months. He can't help arching into your hands, groaning in the back of his throat when they slide over his skin through his shirt. He wants more of your skin. He wants more of you, always.

Sucking on your tongue, his hand slides down your neck to your shoulder, trailing down the bare skin of your arm. The tips of his fingers brush under the hem of your sleeve. It's an accident when they skim over the bottom edge of raised scar tissue, the handprint he branded into your body and soul, but it makes him moan all the same in surprise. He'd forgotten. He doesn't know how he forgot that. You're the soul he found in hell and marked as his own. You're Dean. His.

Breaking away from your mouth with a rough gasp, he buries his face into your neck, gently biting at the skin around the collar of your t-shirt. His hips rolls against yours, blood making his dick twitch and harden. "Dean." He growls against your neck, and shoves his hips down hard against yours once. His hand finds your forearm near his side, grasping it tightly, before he changes his mind and instead worms his fingers under your t-shirt. He strokes up your side, and then across your stomach, shoving your shirt up to your chest so he can duck down to suck an open mouth kiss above your navel. Breathing hard, he works his way back up your body, scraping his teeth over the curve of your ribs, and licking over a nipple, before he presses a kiss to the center of your chest, palm smoothing across your collarbones.

He lingers there, just breathing. "Dean." His pulse beats steadily in the creases of his thighs, drawing his attention to the way his erection presses against the fly of his jeans. Raising up on his knees, he sweeps a hand through his hair and stares down at you. He doesn't know what to do now. Where you'll draw the line. Where they should draw the line. They still need the ability to work together, after all. His tongue sneaks out to prod his lower lip; his mouth feels swollen and numb. The car feels very warm now.

He likes the kiss. It's different than kissing a girl, stubble catching against his lips, your lips not quite as soft. Or maybe he's imagining that because it's what you'd expect. He hasn't kissed anyone in a long while. He slept with Lisa, shared a bed with her night after night for a whole year, and of course they had sex. But making out with Lisa never felt like this, where it makes his chest swell and his heart want to crawl up his throat, where you become the only thing that's important in the world for as long as their lips are locked together. Actually, he's not sure any kiss has felt like this since he was 19. That's maybe a little scary.

He slouches further down when you nudge him, his t-shirt rucking up as his back slides against the leather of the seat. Your thigh settles against his groin and he makes an involuntary sound, a startled grunt in the back of his throat. His fingers clench into the fabric of your shirt and he rolls his hips up against you, his thigh pressing against your groin as he does. Cas. Cas, he's getting hard. He's not sure he's supposed to, with you being a guy and with this being a pretense. Supposedly.

He doesn't want to stop, though, not until you slide your hand under his sleeve and the tips of your fingers brush over the scar there. The touch makes a shiver run down his spine, makes him arch his back in surprise as you moan. He's suddenly very aware of how close you are, how your body is pressed against his as tightly as possible. You're a guy, Cas. You're Cas. You break the kiss moments before he would have, too overwhelmed by the sudden onslaught of the reality of this moment to continue kissing you.

He breathes hard, curls his fingers more tightly into your shirt when you say his name. Twitches a little and tilts his head back when he can feel your teeth against his skin—a sensation that feels good-bad-right-wrong, that he wants more of but doesn't know how to handle if it continued. He lets go of you as you move down, breathing a little more freely when your weight shifts off of his upper body. He runs his fingers into your hair, quietly moans when you kiss his stomach, then lets his eyes half-close in an overwhelmed, blissed-out expression when you move further up to lick his nipple and kiss his chest.

Then you stop, and he's not sure if it's regret or relief he feels. Maybe both; deep, raw regret at the loss of stimulation, and relief because the stimulation was getting far too much. He blinks when you pull back and kneel, his hands sliding over your back down your sides to come to rest on your thighs. He just watches you look down at him for a few moments, shifts his hips a little. He's really hard, Cas. One brief glance at your crotch tells him that you are, too.

"I don't—" He has to clear his throat to stop his voice from catching, meets your eyes again. "I don't wanna pretend. I mean. I'm—not. Pretending." That much should be obvious. He's really not pretending. He wets his lips. "Maybe we—uh. Maybe we need to slow down a little."

Because this is really new, Cas. This is really surprising. He hasn't done this before, and if they continue like this, it's going to freak him out.

There isn't enough space in the Impala for him to sit up fully on his knees. Shoulders hunched, he winds up half-curled over you, one hand resting palm down over the center of your chest and the other gripping the back of the seat. It's cold enough for him to be able to see his breath fog as he pants, but he can't feel the chin. His skin feels prickly with heat and too tight.

He can't stop staring at you. You look—wrecked, Dean. You're staring at his groin, where his erection tents the front of his jeans, as if it's something startling. It makes him swallow, half turned on and half uncomfortably self-conscious. He doesn't know what you expected.

He doesn't know what he expected. Your words hit him like a physical blow. Rocking on his knees, he flinches back from them, breath coming in sharply and brow creasing in confusion.

You're not pretending.

"You—want this." The words come out slow, careful. Suspicious. This was suppose to be one night, Dean. His last night on Earth night, when he gets to have what he wants. What he never had. What he lost. He lost you. "Dean . . ." He starts to shake his head before he's aware that he's doing it. Falling backwards onto his ass, he shifts down the seat from you, towards the opposite door, putting space between them. He only stops because his spine jars hard against the arm rest; he can go no farther.

Several silent seconds stretch by as he stares at you. They're so far off the map right now that he doesn't know how to find his bearings, let alone which direction to go. He glances down, and wets his upper lip, uncomfortable with your admission. He still wants to eat a burger and go home and sleep with you in bed. He wants his last night. He doesn't want to have this conversation. But apparently they have to.

"Uh." He shakes his head again, and then digs his palm into his eye, rubbing it. He's too sober for this. "We can't—we can't have a relationship, Dean." He thought you knew that. Even if their relationship was different here, even if their pasts are different, that's still—a common fact. A universal truth. "Sorry to . . . break it to you." His voice drifts off at the end, sincerely regretful. He offers you a small, wistful half-smile. They can only have one night.

He's as wary and suspicious about the fact that he wants this as you are. You're maybe more suspicious. First and foremost, he's surprised. Really surprised. This took a turn he didn't expect at all.

So he doesn't take you shaking your head and moving away as anything other than what it seems to be—backing up and taking stock. Slowing down. Figuring out what just happened. He sits up as well, uses the few silent moments to gather himself, rubs his hands over his face and takes a deep breath. He's okay now. Glances over at you just as you rub your eyes and start to talk. Your words make him blink, make his eyebrows draw together a little when you meet his eyes. That's—not what he expected you to say.

"No." He shrugs a little. "I mean, I know. Relationships . . ." He trails off, shakes his head and laughs a resigned little laugh. "I've tried enough times to have one to know I'm a lost cause." He meets your eyes again, giving you a small half-smile in return. He's not relationship material. Another shrug, and he looks off to the side, a little awkward. "This was nice, though." He reaches across his chest, slips his fingers under his t-shirt sleeve to rub over the scar tissue on his shoulder. "You—" He turns his head back around, eyes slightly narrowed, determined to be looking at you when he says this. "This was nice."

You know they can't have a relationship. His eyes narrow. Okay. If you know, then why did you say you weren't pretending? His stomach muscles clench as he watches you touch the scar. He wants to put his mouth there. He wants to kiss you again and strip naked and touch every part of you.

But that seems unlikely to happen now.

"So what, uh—." He swallows, aware that the atmosphere in the car has changed, become awkward. He doesn't know what to do about that, so he elects to ignore it as much as possible, striving for a relaxed and apathetic tone. "What did you mean? You didn't want . . . to pretend."

He asked you to pretend like they were in a relationship. That—they were in love, and happy, and had a house together. If you know that's impossible, what did you mean?

He frowns a little. That's—actually, that's a good question. "I didn't—" His dick is still half-hard, maybe a little more than half, and uncomfortably pressing against the zipper of his jeans. He shifts. "I didn't want you to think I was pretending. Like. That I was pretending to enjoy making out. I wasn't." He meets your eyes. "I did actually enjoy it."

More than enjoy. His eyes drop down to your lips, the tip of his tongue tracing over his own as he remembers what you taste like. He's never going to forget that taste, Cas. Never.

"We could still pretend the rest." He meets your eyes again, gives you a bit of a smile. "The burgers, and the sleeping. In your house." He would like that. He may be a lost cause when it comes to relationships, but that doesn't mean they couldn't pretend for one night. It's just one night. Nobody else ever has to know.

You enjoyed kissing him. That's . . . an interesting statement. He can't help the smile that slowly spreads over his face, oddly touched and affectionate. "I never, uh, thought you didn't enjoy sex, Dean." Definitely not when you look at him like that. Though—his brow crinkles again. A thought occurs to him now that the issues has been raised.

He shifts against the door, leaning his shoulder more comfortably into the back of the seat, and slouching down so his leg presses against yours. "Do you enjoy sex? If you didn't, that would explain . . . a lot." In retrospect. "You used to talk often about sex; I never thought to ask you if that was, uh . . ." Something you said rather than felt. If it was a confidence trick, in a sense. "—an act. You're talented at conning people."

Is that part of it? Do you feel obligated to have sex? He didn't want you to feel obligated with him. He's glad that, at least this time, you didn't. That you enjoyed it. That you still want to continue the night.

His boot rubs against yours, helpless to express interest even though he knows they shouldn't have sex. He wasn't going to have sex with you. But now they're talking about it and you're looking at him like that and—you're attractive, Dean. He loves you. He wants to make you smile for him.

That smile is different than your usual one. Your usual one kind of gives him the creeps. This one—it's almost sweet. It makes the corners of his mouth twitch upwards a little, too. You should smile like that more often, Cas.

He glances down when you press your leg against his, a warm weight against his skin. He's still fairly warm, but he should maybe put his jacket back on soon. Not quite yet, though. When you ask him if he enjoys sex, he glances up at you, surprised. You think he conned people into thinking he likes sex?

"Uh, no. I mean." He smiles, laughs a little. "I like sex." He shifts a little, leans more comfortably against the door, his leg pressed up snugly against yours. Maybe this could be a date. He would date you for one night. "There's a lot of pressure to, I dunno. Get it right?" He tilts his head a little. Do you know what he means? "When there's a lot going on, I kinda—I don't do it as much. I haven't had a lot of it in the past couple years, because something was always going on. But generally, yeah. I like it."

He tilts his head a little, curious. He know what he saw in your world, but that's really just one impression. "How about you? I take it you like it?"

When you laugh, his throat tightens up. He has to swallow against the lump that forms. He likes when you laugh. He hasn't heard you laugh—in years.

You like sex, though you feel pressure to do well. Looking back over his experiences with you, he can see that. But it's not what he wanted you to say. It would have explained the way things worked between them if you had said you didn't enjoy sex. He looks down, trying not to let the wave of disappointment engulf him. Did you feel pressure to "get it right" between them? Did you think that was right? Did you care?

He doesn't want to talk about this anymore or think about the past. He wants to go back to kissing you.

"I don't know." If he likes sex or not. He shrugs one shoulder, frowning down at his lap. He's too consumed with his own questions to think very hard about yours. "Humanity is so isolated, trapped alone in your bodies and minds. Disconnected. It makes sense that you engage in acts of gluttony and violence and lust to stave off facing the desolate solitude of your existence." If he was thinking more clearly, he'd acknowledge that fact that, unlike angels, humans don't live with ties to a collective consciousness. His experiences at the camp taught him that some humans still strive for that kind of connection, and even though no shared substance or mutual orgasm can achieve it, enough people were willing to fool themselves that it could. It made it easy for him to fool himself along with them. To keep the loneliness at bay.

He glances over at you. "Do you feel pressure now to get it right?" Between them. Shifting towards you across the leather seat, close enough that their legs tangle, he reaches forward to rest a hand on your thigh. He slides it up to your hip, rubbing gently up and down your side over your t-shirt. Touching you like this is still a rarity, a gift. He stares earnestly into your eyes. You said they could continue to pretend. "If we—had sex. Would you want to get it right?"

Make it be how it's suppose to be? He swallows again, convulsively. He would consider having sex with you if they could get it right this time.

You seem a little disappointed with his answer. He's not sure why. You seemed like you would enjoy having sex with him not ten minutes ago. Why are you disappointed when he tells you that he does, in fact, enjoy sex? That's—kind of a dumb question, actually. Since the only explanation can be that the him in your world didn't enjoy sex with you. And that you know that. That realization makes him watch your face, curious, thoughtful. He feels like he'd enjoy having sex with you. It's surprising, but a pretty definite impression he's getting. He's not sure if that impression is wrong. Or if the him in your world had other reasons not to enjoy sex with you.

You distract him by talking about the desolate solitude of human existence. That's cheerful, Cas. It makes him frown a little; he wants to protest, but can't really think of anything to say. You look up, though, meet his eyes and ask him a question, and then you move closer. His throat dries up immediately, and he swallows, shifts a little to be able to reach out, slide his hand over your thigh to where you're resting your hand that you're not using to touch him. Tries to interlace his fingers with yours, still holding your eyes.

"Yeah." That's kind of quiet, so he clears his throat. "I'd want it to be good. To be right." He wets his lips, swallows. "I don't know—if I could get it right. Tonight. This is all, uh. It's all happening kinda quickly."

He doesn't want to rush and mess it up. He's not sure how that synchs up their agreement to keep this to one single night.

The touch to his hand causes him to look down. Lifting his hand off his leg, he watches you slide their fingers together and presses their palms together, fingers folding over the back of your hand. That's strangely intimate. For all that he's touched you in ways considered by human society to be private and committed acts, sex—isn't that, in practice. This, right now, feels more personal and more vulnerable. It feels more akin to touching your soul.

He wishes he could still do that.

His mouth quirks up in a tiny smile when you say you'd want it to be good between them. He wants that too. They could try. Except that you don't want to. You don't want to—mess it up. He holds your eyes. "You know how, Dean." To do this right. He trusts that—you love him. Even if it's a different kind of love than how he feels for you.

Slowly, he tilts his head and leans into your space. He sucks a soft kiss against your mouth, tender, squeezing your hand in his once. It's not exactly sexual but not exactly chaste. Meeting your eyes for a moment, he places another kiss on the arch of your cheekbone, lingering there, his nose resting against your temple. His chest aches. He closes his eyes.

It's this, Dean. It's this. This is what has never worked between them.

For a second, it feels like he can't breathe, and then he forces his body to take in a small gasp of air. "Dean." His cheek slides against yours. "I miss you." He doesn't know what to do without you.

He knows how. How what? How to get it right? You lean in, slow enough so he can watch you. He lets his eyes slide half-closed when you press your lips to his, tightens his hand in return when he feels your fingers squeeze his. You still taste like you did a few minutes ago. You still make his heart beat in his throat, make him want to pull you closer.

He doesn't. Instead, he raises his other hand, brushes his fingers against your knee, trails them along the lines of your leg and thigh as he briefly meets your eyes. You seem upset all of a sudden. He's not sure why, until you tell him. You miss him. That doesn't make a whole lot of sense for you to say right now, except he understands. He misses you, too.

He slides his hand up over your back until he can cup the back of your neck. Rubs your skin there with his thumb, then turns his head just enough so he can press a kiss to your cheek, just below your ear. He leaves his mouth cupped against you, warm breath condensing against your skin. "I'm right here, Cas." Low, quiet. "Right here."

And so are you. Don't go away.

You keep touching him. It's—new. It's nice. You haven't been this demonstrative since he first became mortal, and you held him up, literally and figuratively, until he figured out how to do it himself. He's missed it. He's missed being—friends. The kind who can care for each other rather than hurt. He slides the hand on your hip around to the small of your back, leaning into you, against you. It's getting cold in the car, the fog on the windows from earlier now dissipating. But for the most part, he's perfectly content to sit here with you for the rest of the night—for every night—reclined against the door in the back of the Impala with one of your tapes playing.

He doesn't say anything for a long while. There's nothing to be said. He slouches down a little until his head can rest against your shoulder again, comfortable and comforting. You're right here. He knows. You're here now. You're still you.

As he relaxes against you, he plays casually with your fingers, stretching them out and rubbing his thumb over the callouses on your palm. They're familiar. Eventually he speaks.

"Do you still want to get, uh—burgers?" He tilts his chin to be able to glance up at you. Are you hungry, Dean? He would like to eat a cheeseburger again with you.

It's funny how well they fit together. He thinks about that as you rest against him, about how easily your body fits against his, even though you're not a woman. You don't have boobs, or curves, or delicate limbs that you can fold up to huddle against him, but you still fit. Maybe even better than anyone else ever has. It's odd. But it's also nice.

He's not sure if that means that he's gay. He's getting the impression that he might be, a little. But on the other hand, you're not a guy. Not really. You're an angel. He's not sure how the male/female thing works with angels. Maybe he should ask. Not right now, though. Right now, he's fine just sitting here and absentmindedly threading his fingers through the strands at the back of your neck, enjoying your weight and your warmth resting against him.

When you speak and glance up at him, he shifts his head just enough to be able to look down and meet your eyes. Smiles a little when you suggest to get burgers. It's midnight, Cas. Probably a little later. Not exactly dinner time. Not that it matters.

"Always." He tightens his fingers around yours, rubs his thumb along the side of your hand. "And pie. We should get pie. I haven't had pie in weeks."

At least three. Since Bobby died. He didn't feel like it. He feels like it now.

He likes your fingers playing with his hair. It creates a light, ticklish sensation, raising goose pimples on the back of his neck. He shivers a little from it, and from the chill settling into the car. It's cold. He shouldn't have let himself get so cold; his room isn't that warm.

But he still wants a burger. And you want pie. "I—forgot. You like pie." He doesn't remember when he found that out originally, or how. He wants you to have pie, and anything else you love. Stretching out his neck, he ducks up for another soft kiss, enjoying the fact that he can for right now. That you seem to like it. He shivers again as he pulls back, more violently this time, from the cold. In truth, he's far more cold than he is hungry.

His shirts and jacket are still in the front seat where he left them. He snags his sweatshirt from where he dropped it and pulls it quickly over his head. He wants his comforter, and the space heater. He wants to go back to cuddling with you. Leaning his elbows on the back of the front seat, he turns to look at you over his shoulder, awkward and apologetic.

"I—you should have pie, Dean. But I . . . I'd like to go back." To the house. Where it's warm. He knows he's lost muscle mass in the last six months, though he doesn't think the food he eats is all that different from what was available at the camp in terms of quality. He's not sure about quantity. Whatever the case, it leaves his body more and more susceptible to cold as winter sets in. Gripping the seat back, he slides one leg onto the front seat, and then the other. As he pulls his jacket back on, he glances around at you.

"Raincheck?"

You forgot he likes pie. That makes him give you a sideglance, eyebrows raised. He didn't think that would be an easy thing to forget about him. But then, there probably wasn't a whole lot of pie during the apocalypse. So you would have spent quite a bit of time around him with no access to pie.

That's actually a fairly sad thought, so he's glad when you kiss him, distract him. You shiver as you pull back, and he frowns a little. "Are you cold?"

Apparently, since you're getting your sweatshirt. He watches your shirt ride up a little as you lean over the back of the front seat and expose bare skin just above the waistband of your jeans, which are barely clinging to your hips. You're really skinny, Cas. No wonder you're cold.

He meets your eyes when you glance around, and isn't surprised when you say you'd rather go back. He leans down to gather up his shirt and jacket up when you clamber over the backrest, then looks up to meet your eyes and nods when you ask for a raincheck.

"Sure, Cas. Don't worry about it." They can grab a burger whenever. Shirt and jacket in hand, he exits the car to slide around back into the front seat. The cold bites into his exposed skin, and he quickly shrugs his layers back on before he gets into the driver's seat next to you.

"It's really friggin' cold out there." He blows on his fingers, shudders once before he looks back over at you. "You okay? You should've said something if you were cold."

Without waiting for a reply, he puts the car in reverse and starts to back her up to the street. Meets your eyes as he turns around to see where he's going, and gives you a a slightly lascivious smile. "Let's get ourselves warmed up, all right?"

Once you tell him not to worry about it, he regrets asking to go back. There might be an opportunity later on to eat a burger with you, but not like this. Not—together like this. There will be Sam. And the Leviathans. There will be missions. He doesn't want to fight anymore. He wants to stay curled up with you somewhere and hold your hand and watch your eyes turn glassy from kissing you. They still have the rest of the night left for that.

As soon as you've directed the car back towards the road, he shuffles over to sit next to you again, thighs and shoulders pressed together. He stretches his arm across your waist in half a hug, hand tucked against your ribs inside your jacket for warmth, and sticks his face into your neck. "It's fine, Dean." He'll warm up eventually.

And you seem willing to help, even if you don't want to have sex. That may be the right choice in this situation. He's had a lot of unfulfilling sex with you; he doesn't need to repeat the experience. Not when this is so much nicer.

He mouths a little at your neck, a line of gentle kisses along the column of exposed skin between your jaw and your jacket collar, not intended to solicit any response. For the fifteen minute drive back to Bobby's house, he does that, and otherwise stays quiet, listening to the music and breathing you in.

Once you park the Impala, he moves so he can kiss your mouth, humming lowly in contentment in the back of his throat at the soft, slick feel of your lips. He likes this. He likes being allowed to do this. He pulls back just enough to lean his forehead against yours.

"Will you take your clothes off? Inside." So they can sleep that way, and maybe kiss some more. He hugs lightly at the lapel of your jacket and nuzzles his nose against yours. Please?

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Lord it's a hard life God makes you live.

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